Lighting control of ceiling mounted fluorescent lamps together with light dimming systems have been variously seen in the prior art, such in U.S. Pat. No. 3,697,821. In this previous arrangement, semiconductor multiple remote control units have been used to switch and dim lights. A remote control unit is provided for individually and independently controlling the operation of a common lamp dimmer unit by turning on and off the dimmer unit and controlling the brightness of the lamps independently of previous settings or conditions of the remote control units. A three wire conductor system is utilized to connect various remote control units in parallel with one another.
In U.S. Pat. 4,733,138 a programmable lighting circuit controller for controlling a plurality of household lighting circuits includes a microprocessor and an electronically erasable programmable read-only memory for programming household lighting circuits for a variety of loads. One of the lighting circuits may include fluorescent loads by using a heater circuit for the fluorescent lamps. The microprocessor is controlled to raise and lower lighting levels, set lighting levels in memory and recall preset levels from memory, as well as to provide heating for the fluorescent lights.
This arrangement provides a multi-gain wall-mounted lighting circuit controller which may be programmed to control both heating circuits and fluorescent light circuits by appropriate control of the microprocessor. This prior arrangement enables computer control of various combinations of lighting levels and functions to differing configurations depending on whether incandescent lighting or fluorescent lighting is to be used.
Both of these prior schemes for controlling lighting circuits, and in particular fluorescent lighting circuits, fail to provide a control system of connected electronic potentiometer wall units providing control from many different positions using optimum wiring for operation of both the entire lighting system and portions of lighting system.